Marcus Richards
EcoStardust is an award-winning business that sells a plant-based alternative to traditional plastic-based glitter, which biodegrades in the natural environment within weeks, helping people to Glitter Without The Litter!
Tell us about yourself?
I am Kath, lover of glitter, festivals, dressing up and the environment. I worked as an Assistant Finance Manager for a large care home company, then I joined an ecommerce agency. I loved it there and working with ecommerce sites. EcoStardust grew very organically from my own interest of finding alternatives to plastics in my lif and was started as a side hustle but grew rapidly and I had to decide which was more important to me, so I left my job to focus on my business full time, 5 months after launching.
If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?
Enjoy every moment of the journey as a pandemic is about to happen and what you thought was a bad day before, won’t seem quite so bad soon. Also, as a soon to be Mum, it is ok to rest and take your foot off the pedal, your business wont just disappear over night if you take time off.
What problem does your business solve?
EcoStardust Glitter is made from plant cellulose predominantly from sustainably farmed Eucalyptus Trees.
It has been predicted that by 2050 there will be more plastic in the sea than fish. Glitter contributes a small percentage of this, however, as it is a microplastic it is problematic when found in marine environments.
Bioglitter has been independently tested and proven to biodegrade in a freshwater environment within weeks.
What is the inspiration behind your business?
I was throwing a glitter & glamour Hollywood themed party and bought kilo bags of glitter. When I saw the ingredients label and that it was made from plastic, it dawned on me that I had been littering and took the shine out of it for me. I went on a search for an alternative and discovered Bioglitter® however, it was not readily available to consumers so I decided to bring this to market under the name of EcoStardust.
What is your magic sauce?
We offer a selection of different glitters, all independently tested and proven to biodegrade in a freshwater environment. Everything is packaged in sustainable packaging and try and have as minimal impact on the planet as possible. We live by our values and put product and plant before profit.
What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?
I would love to bring out our own ethical makeup line, a bath & body products line and also set up physical location to sell all of these products, run workshops and promote sustainable ways of doing business.
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?
Packaging has been my biggest challenge. I have always wanted eco friendly packaging and when I was starting out there were not a lot of options. If I found something a bit more eco friendly, the MOQs would be large and as a small business I couldn’t afford to buy them. I would hate to tally up how many hours I have spent researching packaging. However, we have always done the best we can at the time with the funds we have and as soon as there has been an opportunity to improve we have taken it so I am super proud of that.
How do people get involved/buy into your vision?
I would love to hear from any potential stockists, but more importantly we also run a non-bioglitter amnesty where people can send us their #GuiltyGlitter and we turn it into jewellery to keep it out of the environment, then we send them a discount code to use on our website to replace their glitter with eco glitter so I would love for more people to get involved with this and remove plastic glitter from circulation. https://ecostardust.com/pages/non-bioglitter-amnesty
For any queries, please contact us via [email protected]
